Solaris' Soon-to-be Immense Book of One-Shots
by dh2o
Summary: A collection of probably-not-that-great one-shots from your probably-not-favorite author. Enjoy! Rated T because Warriors, and I'm paranoid, why else?
1. I: Tornstar

**A/N: So hi all, this is a collection of one-shots, some of them will be based on prompts from a really cool blog called Ailuronymy, and this is the first of a series of pieces of writing, so, uh, enjoy, and please review!**

**Also I'm going to try to not have so many author notes so if I have a lot feel free to be like "solaris stahp" and I'll be like "yeah okay" and we can have tea or something idk im just going to let you all read now byebye**

**edit: yayy I edited it, btw, for anyone who read it before the edit, Daisyfoot is now Daisyclaw, don't be alarmed. :3**

* * *

><p>Tornstar was dead, to begin with.<p>

That was only the start of a long chain of tragedy.

Soon after Tornstar's death, his deputy and his deputy's two deputies joined him. The nearly earless leader had suffered a slow, painful death by greencough, and his Clanmates had spent an entire snowbound night by his side in mourning.

When a cold dawn fell over the camp, the elders had left camp to bury his body.

The next two days followed a similar pattern.

But all of this was hardly the least of the big problem: who would succeed Tornstar as leader.

Neither his deputy nor his deputy's deputies had been given enough time to chose a replacement, but the entire Clan knew there were only two appropriate candidates: Daisyclaw, a young cream-colored she-cat, and Mudnose, an older brown tom.

On the third day after Tornstar's death, the clearing of ThunderClan's camp was full to the brim with the Clan's cats. An empty space in its center allowed Daisyclaw and Mudnose to emerge from the pack, staring each other down.

The crowd shuffled as the two took a step closer to each other, unsheathing their claws.

"I'm ready to fight for leadership."

Mudnose's low statement broke the silence in the cold camp. Daisyclaw smirked.

"So am I."

They advanced again and began walking in a circle, never taking their eyes off each other. Mudnose flexed his claws, amber eyes bright with the promise of battle. Daisyclaw, tail waving from side to side, narrowed her emerald ones, which shone with hostility.

Pinefur, the medicine cat, watched desperately from the edge of the clearing, his young apprentice Graypaw beside him. Looking up at his mentor, Graypaw murmured, "Surely they won't fight?"

"With every heartbeat that passes, I'm getting more and more certain they will," the medicine cat whispered. Graypaw's eyes widened as Daisyclaw, fur bristling, yowled and leaped into the air.

Mudnose moved to the side, but Daisyclaw twisted in midair, landing on the tom's back. Digging her claws in, she held on furiously as the crowd shuffled around her, making room for the fighting cats.

_Should I try to stop them? _Graypaw wondered, feeling his legs tremble beneath him.

Mudnose yowled and flattened himself to the ground, playing dead. His ploy failed to fool Daisyclaw, who turned quickly to try to lower her head and bite his shoulder. She fell off of the burly tom's back and rolled away almost immediately, kicking up dust. Taking advantage of his opponent's situation, Mudnose hopped to his paws and pounced on Daisyclaw, rolling across the open space, scratching and biting at her.

Graypaw, growing more desperate by the minute, leaped onto the battlefield and yowled, "STOP!"

Daisyclaw and Mudnose halted, claws digging into each other's fur as the tabby apprentice shot them a desperate look.

"You're fighting for nothing. If you keep up, you're going to kill each other, and where will we be then? It will be impossible to pick a new deputy, with all the able warriors we have." He briefly cast his gaze through the crowd, staring boldly at the shuffling cats. "Please, stop."

Daisyclaw and Mudnose hesitated before looking at each other, the same question burning in their eyes.

Daisyclaw nodded, and the brown-furred warrior separated himself from her, standing shakily on his paws while blood leaked profusely from a wound on his neck. The cream-colored she-cat stood by his side, weakly supporting him.

Pinefur gasped sharply and sprinted over to Mudnose. Daisyclaw, panting, collapsed onto the ground, allowing the medicine cat and his apprentice to gently, slowly nudge Mudnose into their den. When they arrived, Mudnose's wound was still bleeding, though less than before, and his breathing was growing fainter. Graypaw glanced at his mentor.

"Will he live?"

Pinefur hesitated for what felt like eternity to Graypaw before shaking his head. "No. The wound was too deep."

Graypaw let in a sharp intake of breath as Pinefur turned away from the dying warrior, calling over Daisyclaw.

The she-cat soon appeared, and Graypaw saw she knew what had happened from the look Pinefur gave her. Slowly padding towards Mudnose, she settled down beside him.

"Mudnose?"

The warrior's eyes opened slightly. "Daisyclaw?"

"I'm…I'm sorry about this. I would have made you my deputy, you know."

Mudnose shook his head slowly. "No. It's…it's alright. I know you'll make a…great leader." The tom coughed up blood on the last word. His voice was wheezy and old, older than it should have sounded.

Daisyclaw hung her head as Mudnose took his shuddering last breath and lay still.

A few heartbeats later, the she-cat let out a choked sob and raised her head. "I guess I sh-should go to the Moonstone s-soon?"

Pinefur, who was staring determinedly at the wall of the den, nodded. "We'll get going, but let me talk to Graypaw first."

Daisyclaw nodded as Pinefur looked to his apprentice, who stood as the blue-gray medicine cat padded towards him.

"Graypaw," he murmured, "next time we go to the half-moon meeting, I think I'll give you your full medicine cat name. You did well."

The apprentice gasped, eyes shining as he looked to his now-smiling mentor, who grinned back as he approached Daisyclaw. "It's time to go."

Daisyclaw nodded, raising her head. "I'm ready."

Curling up in his nest, Graypaw smiled to himself as he settled into the moss. _She'll make a great leader. Daisystar and her medicine cats, Pinefur and…well, whatever name Pinefur will give me._

_Maybe I'll ask for Grayleaf. Yes, I think Grayleaf will work._

Yawning, Graypaw soon drifted into a deep, comfortable sleep.


	2. II: Biting The Dust

As the patrol prowled close nearby, the kitten in the ditch began to wail again.

Brightpaw heard it first. Raising her head, the gray-and-white she-cat angled her ears toward the other side of the stone wall. Her orange eyes were bright as she caught the wail again.

Unsheathing her claws, the apprentice leaped up to the wall, digging her claws into it and hiking up to its top, where dull gray bricks had been lain in a long, perfect row, one that seemed to stretch out endlessly towards the horizon.

Peering at the other side of the fence, she saw a thin brown kitten with matted fur laying in a small ball in a circular ring in the ground. Its amber eyes were dull and weak with hunger and pain.

Glancing over at the patrol, who had stopped and were starting to look for Brightpaw, the apprentice knew she had no other choice. Closing her eyes, she inhaled sharply and leaped off the wall.

Landing neatly on the dirt by the edge of the ditch, Brightpaw gently prodded the kitten, which wailed again, slightly louder this time. Lowering her head, she gripped the kit by its scruff and turned back towards the wall.

_Ridiculous Twolegs, digging weird rings and leaving kittens in them. Great StarClan._

Rolling her eyes, the longhair apprentice leaped back up to the top of the wall, digging her claws into the stone once again. She had almost reached the top of the wall on her leap, and scrabbled against the stone, hauling herself back to the top of the wall.

Addertail, the leader of the patrol, looked up to Brightpaw.

"Brightpaw! Why in the name of StarClan did you go down there- wait, is that a kit?"

The other two members of the patrol, Cherryflight and Sandfang, glanced over at Brightpaw. The older cats easily made out the lump of brown against Brightpaw's gray-and-white fur.

"Great StarClan, that is a kit!" exclaimed Sandfang, hopping up to the top of the wall. "I'll take it."

Brightpaw smiled, lowering the kit onto the wall. It let out a small wail as it hit the stone, and again as Sandfang took it by the scruff.

Springing back to ground level, the two cats returned to the patrol.

Addertail examined the kit, green eyes bright.

"Two or three moons old, I'd guess." He looked up to Brightpaw. "Where was it?"

"In a ditch on the other side of the wall," the apprentice replied. The kit wailed pitifully and Brightpaw's orange eyes narrowed. "Come on, let's get it back to camp."

Addertail nodded. "Come on, everyone."

Turning away from the wall separating the Clans from the abandoned Twolegplace, the four set off toward home.

* * *

><p>"Dustfeather!"<p>

Brightstar smiled weakly as the lithe brown she-cat appeared by her side, amber eyes bright.

"Thanks," Brightstar mewed as she swatted her claws across a gray warrior's muzzle.

For moons, war had gripped IceClan and RainClan with deadly talons, at first small skirmishes during border patrols, but eventually full-on battles. This would be the last of the fights, the one that would decide which Clan was better, which would return home bearing the spoils of victory.

Brightstar grinned as Dustfeather lashed her claws down a ginger she-cat's flank and bit into a black tom's shoulder, sending both reeling. Tackling a dark-colored tabby, Brightstar slashed her hind claws into its belly, feeling blood well up at their tips.

Leaping off the tabby, Brightstar fought off another warrior and raised her head proudly as she saw the RainClan cats beginning to retreat.

"Dustfeather! We've won! We-"

The longhair she-cat broke off at the sight of her friend.

Dustfeather was laying on her side, blood pouring into a pool from two large wounds, one on her belly, one on her neck.

Falling to the ground, Brightstar prodded Dustfeather and the day they met tumbled terribly into her mind, the day she'd been an apprentice and Dustfeather a kitten in a ditch.

"D-Dustfeather…no! No, please, Dustfeather, don't go! I need you! I was going to make you my deputy, and someday a leader after me! Please, Dustfeather, don't leave me."

Dustfeather's amber eyes slowly opened. "I'm…I'm sorry, Brightstar," she croaked, letting out a shuddering gasp. "I'm sorry I…can't do that for you. Especially…when you've done so much for me."

Brightstar's eyes were bright with desperation. "Please, Dustfeather. We can take you to Birchberry. He'll heal you right up. Please."

"No…good…goodbye, Brightstar."

Dustfeather's head slowly drooped back onto the dirt floor of the clearing, and a small breath of air pushed out of her.

Her last breath.

The very, very last.

Brightstar slowly reached out a paw and laid it on Dustfeather's, the one that was held out to her.

_Goodbye, old friend._

_Goodbye._


	3. III: Lilyfang's Wish

**A/N: Hello all! I'm back again with a short new one-shot. This one's about, well...I'll let you see! :3**

**(please review c:)**

* * *

><p>This is where the bad cats went.<p>

This place. The Dark Forest.

I knew it as soon as I got in.

And do you know what?

I was pretty happy.

I'd made friends in the Dark Forest. I was one of the innocent ones, duped into believing what I learned was for the good of my Clan. I never noticed how the Dark Forest was taking me, how every day I dreaded leaving the slimy darkness of the trees.

I never thought I'd end up here, either.

But after the Great Battle, those goody-two-paws StarClan cats rejected me.

How was I supposed to know what was going on? When the time came, I had to pick a side, and I picked the Dark Forest.

I never liked my Clanmates anyway.

They always thought I was useless. But the Dark Forest saw value in me. Where my Clanmates saw an eye scratched out by a badger and a paw bent backward from birth, the Dark Forest saw potential. They saw strength and greatness. They took me in when no others would, and they trained me.

Normal apprentice training was never enough. My mentor tried, but she wasn't good either. No one was.

After I learned how cruel cats could be, I kept to myself. I only made two friends, my very best. I miss them, but I know afterlife in the Dark Forest is better than being with them.

Even if they were the only ones who understood me, who saw past the broken paw & the scratched eye.

My very best friends. Firfoot and Briarcloud.

They were always so patient with me, even when I had outbursts of anger, outbursts of affection, when I exploded.

Toms were always falling over their paws for Briarcloud. But she was never interested. And it's funny - all Firfoot ever wanted was a mate, but she ended up friends with the most and least popular cats in the Clan. Not a good way to fall in love.

Back to what I was saying.

Now that I'm here, I'm happy to live out my afterlife in the Dark Forest. I can finally be around those I trained with in my dreams.

And I'll be here for a long while. A good while, I think. I made sure the living remember me - some of them, anyways.

I wonder how that kit is faring now, up high in the heavens, fur sparkling with stars, playing with other kits?

Hah.

I don't need to think about that.

I don't need to wish my way out of here.

I love it here.

I really, truly do.

But I wish they'd believe me.


	4. IV: Accidental

**A/N: Here's a quick one where a couple of cats fell in love. c: hope you enjoy, and please review!**

**(wow its been ages since i updated)**

* * *

><p>"So…you're saying this <em>wasn't <em>an accident?"

Littlefur raised her head, staring straight into Batstar's eyes. The leader fidgeted uncomfortably before hesitantly replying with just an "um."

The calico she-cat snarled. "Batstar, you useless furball. This was an accident. _This," _she repeated, pointing her tail at the three small bodies by her belly, "was an accident. You know we're in different Clans. The warrior code doesn't let us do this. These three are accidental."

Batstar pawed at the ground. "Littlefur, I…I…"

"Yeah, yeah, 'I, I' all you want, Batstar, but the fact remains: _we shouldn't have done this._"

Hurt shone in the leader's green eyes, and Littlefur felt a small tremor of apology mixed with love for him.

"Sorry…" she murmured. "It's just that…I never wanted kits, okay? I just wanted tolove, and I fell in love with you, and, and…"

"It's alright. I'm sorry." Batstar bowed his head.

Littlefur widened her eyes for a moment before looking to the kits. Two of them were calico, the spitting images of their mother, and the other a replica of its father.

"What will we name them?" Batstar asked quietly, glancing at them as well.

"This one's small, like me," Littlefur mewed, gently prodding a small she-kit. "Let's name her Tinykit."

Batstar nodded. "Fitting."

"And the other," Littlefur continued, "is Patchkit."

Batstar suddenly found himself smiling. "Can I name the next one?" he asked impulsively, afraid for a moment that he'd been too quick.

Littlefur flashed an amber gaze at him, then nodded.

Looking to the dark brown kit, Batstar hit upon the perfect name almost immediately. "How about Cedarkit?"

Littlefur nodded again, this time a little more slowly. "Like your old deputy?"

The leader nodded. "Yes. Don't forget he was my brother and best friend, too."

The queen smiled. "Even if I never wanted to have kits, I already love them so much. Thank you, Batstar." Pushing her head out, she nuzzled her mate.

Batstar smiled back. "You're welcome."

Looking out at the pale dawn light shining through the trees, Batstar knew he would have to make a quick getaway. He glanced back at his mate, who nodded in understanding, mouthing, "Go. I'll take care of the kits."

Turning, he thought to himself, _Even if they never know their real father, they'll always have a great mother, _he thought with a grin as he sprinted into the forest.


	5. V: Waves

**A/N: I havent updated in ages wow look at me go**

**anyways enjoy & i dont own erin hunter (IF I DID I WOULDN'T NAME A CHARACTER HARRYKIT)**

**tw: blood, death, etc.**

"You _know _how I loathe violence."

"Yes, I do."

Silverheart shivered as a drop of water fell from the roof of the cave, splashing silently onto her pelt. The silver she-cat shuffled beneath the stone-spike above her, eyes dark, mouth shaped into a frown.

"Then why would you have me take part in this battle?"

Silverheart shook her head. "I'm sorry, Mottleleaf. I really don't know."

Mottleleaf snorted, green eyes bright. "As usual. I'm sure Nettletail would know why. In fact, Nettletail would easily find a way for me to avoid this!"

A hiss broke from the silver she-cat. "Shut up, would you? I'm trying to help you and all you're doing is being mouse-brained!"

Mottleleaf's eyes still glimmered with amusement, but she held her tongue as Silverheart stood, pacing from one wall of the cave to the other, trying to ignore the screams echoing from its entrance.

Sighing, Silverheart sat on the rocky floor, studying her paws. After a moment, Mottleleaf stood.

"If you're going to keep being useless, I suppose I'll have to find my way past those mouse-brains."

Silverheart didn't reply, only acknowledging her mother with a flick of her ear.

With another snort, the mottled she-cat pranced towards the entrance to the cave, grimacing as she dipped one paw into a small, sticky puddle on the floor-

_Wait._

_I'm not close enough to the entrance to step in blood!_

_What's going on?_

Mottleleaf's eyes widened as she felt something moving slowly against her fur, lapping like a million tongues at her pelt. She slowly turned her head and saw blood beginning to rise up around her in waves.

_N-no! This is a nightmare!_

A single yowl brought darkness to her vision.

"Mottleleaf!"

Mottleleaf awoke with Silverheart's voice in her ear. Scrambling to her paws, the former medicine cat hissed, backing away from the warrior.

"What happened?" Silverheart's eyes, blue as a greenleaf sky, were bright with worry.

"I-I received a vision." Mottleleaf began to pace, studying the floor of the cave.

"What was it?"

"Blood. All around me, but only surrounding me. It was about to drown me when I fainted."

Silverheart didn't reply, and when Mottleleaf glanced up to look at the warrior, she saw a silver, striped back.

After a moment of silence, the tabby looked to Mottleleaf. "Then you'll _have _to go out there."

The screams of battle still raged outside, though they had grown quieter now.

"No way." Mottleleaf quickly shook her head. "Never."

"But you have to!" Silverheart pleaded. "You have to tell Applestar about your vision!"

A flicker of doubt shone in Mottleleaf's eyes before she sighed.

"Fine."

Silverheart let out a relieved, small sigh. "Thank you."

Mottleleaf dipped her head before turning and slowly approaching the exit to the cave. As she was about to leave the dark, spiky room, she glanced back at Silverheart, who did not see her.

"Applestar!" Mottleleaf yowled.

Darting through the battle, Mottleleaf searched desperately for the telltale ginger pelt of her leader.

"Applestar!"

She just managed to duck as a small gray cat - _an apprentice, _she thought - flew overhead, pursued by a screeching sand-colored tabby warrior.

"APPLESTAR!"

Mottleleaf could feel panic growing within her; swinging her head side to side, she caught a flicker of ginger farther off. Focusing her vision, she saw Applestar locked in combat with a warrior so bloodied Mottleleaf could not see the real color of their pelt.

"APPLESTAR!"

Shouting, Mottleleaf hurtled into the fray, moving like a rabbit towards the ginger cat.

_Got - to - keep - moving, _she thought in bursts, breathing out short, sharp breaths.

"APPLESTAR, LISTEN!"

With a yowl and a _thud,_ the crimson warrior flew back into the mêlée, pushed away by Applestar, who was panting, her pelt covered in blood as she snarled, glaring straight at Mottleleaf.

"What is it? There's only so much time to talk in the midst of battle!" Applestar spat.

"I-I had a vision!"

"What vision?" The leader's amber eyes narrowed.

"I was nearly drowning in blood, back when I was in the cave! I don't know what it means!"

Hardly a heartbeat passed before Applestar's gaze hardened.

"It meant nothing. You are no longer a medicine cat; why should I trust what your old, delusional mind sees?"

Mottleleaf gasped. "Applestar! You can't-"

Hissing, Applestar spat into Mottleleaf's face. "I can do what I want."

Bounding away into battle, the ginger she-cat left Mottleleaf at the edge of the fray, her pelt already specked with blood.

"I knew it would happen. I knew my vision spoke the truth."

Mottleleaf sat in the cave again, looking blankly at the body of Applestar.

"I knew she would die, and all of StoneClan too."

"Mottleleaf, don't blame yourself! It was Applestar's mouse-brainedness!" exclaimed Nettletail, who sat next to Silverheart among the bodies.

Mottleleaf raised her head, casting her gaze through the cave, feeling a small thorn in her heart at the sight of each dead warrior. Even if she had grown bitter after her demotion, she still cared. Didn't she?

"Mottleleaf…they're dead."

The mottled she-cat immediately shot a glare at Silverheart, who had spoken. "I know they are, mouse-brain."

Silverheart recoiled, hurt glowing in her eyes as Nettletail stood, murmuring something into her sister's ear. After a moment, Silverheart nodded and stood as well.

"We're going to go." The silver she-cat's voice broke on the word "go."

Mottleleaf slowly looked back at Applestar's body, muttering, "It doesn't matter," just loud enough to be heard.

With a swish of their tails, the nearly identical she-cats turned and padded through the cave, heading towards the sunlit entrance that Mottleleaf had dashed out of only the night before.

The mottled she-cat raised her head at the last second, long enough to see blood pouring into the cave.


	6. VI: Forever

**A/N: whoot I felt like writing something romantic so I decided to write about a pair of toms who fell in love (yes thats right i finally wrote gay cats). c:**

**tw: being in love but your crush does not know you exist, gay cats, shipping/love in general**

* * *

><p>That deputy was the bane of his existence and the love of his life.<p>

Foxnose was infuriated. Why was Mosscloud so handsome, so charming, so funny? It simply _had _to be illegal. Surely some part of the warrior code outlawed it.

But the ginger warrior knew there wasn't, and it broke him every day to pad out of the warriors' den and see the love of his life sending out patrols and being a normal deputy and hardly knowing Foxnose really existed beyond being one of the Clan's best trackers? Why not be in love?

_Sure, _Foxnose thought, _neither of us has much experience with that,__ but there's a first time for everything._

"Foxnose!"

Foxnose's yellow eyes fluttered open and drifted up to see the amber glare of possibly the most pretentious and annoying warrior in the Clan: Snowfoot, a lithe white she-cat who, though she'd only been a warrior for two moons, was already acting like a deputy.

"Come on, Mosscloud wants you to hunt with me, Berrypaw, and Spiderfang."

The she-cat turned, brushing Foxnose's nose with her tail, causing him to sneeze. Blinking, the tom grumbled something and rose to his paws, stalking out into the wintery cold of the camp.

His heart quickened at the sight of Mosscloud nearby. The ginger-and-white tom was in deep discussion with Lightstar. Both were fidgeting and casting glances around them as though they suspected an attack at any moment.

Foxnose wondered what was wrong before shrugging the thoughts off. _It doesn't matter. Not my place to deal with that._

As the ginger warrior slipped out of camp, he couldn't help but throw a last look at Mosscloud.

* * *

><p>Foxnose paced through the forest, a light layer of snow under his paws, muffling his steps. He parted his jaws, tasting the air and catching a faint whiff of mouse nearby. Signaling to the rest of the patrol (which he led, thankfully), he crouched, sneaking towards the mouse, silent as shadows.<p>

Though his pelt no longer blended in with the season's leaves as it had in leaf-fall, Foxnose knew the mouse wouldn't know or care, being so busy foraging for food.

He caught a flash of gray fur and leaped, knowing he was far from the correct pouncing distance. He landed with a pitiful _thump_ in the snow and flattened his ears.

_Snowfoot will kill me for this. The whole camp will know by sundown._

As if on cue, a sharp laugh sounded from behind him, and light pawsteps in the snow heralded Snowfoot's arrival.

"Wow, look at you go, Foxnose. Nice pouncing! Maybe Lightstar should rename you Greatpounce, to show your abilities!"

Foxnose seethed, feeling as though his ginger pelt would burst into flames in a moment, melting the snow in the forest to water, enough to flood out of the territory, taking Snowfoot with it.

No one really knew why Snowfoot was so horrible, but many told behind-the-back gossip and rumors about her past. When she was about four or five moons old, Snowfoot had come crawling into the camp, bleeding from a large, deep wound in her flank, as well as many smaller wounds, and no cat had any idea what had happened to her. The Clan simply accepted her and moved on.

Foxnose was almost fully back on his paws when he almost collapsed.

"What's going on?"

The voice of Mosscloud broke into his shame, and he felt it flood back, heat burning beneath his fur.

_Oh, StarClan, no._

_No. Please, no._

"Oh, Mosscloud!"

_NO._

Snowfoot couldn't possibly give Mosscloud her version of the story. No way.

_Over my dead body!_

Rising fully, Foxnose turned and leaped over to Snowfoot, who was practically dancing on her paws, obviously a heartbeat away from beginning the story.

Foxnose slapped his tail to Snowfoot's mouth, giving an anxious laugh. "Oh, I just messed up trying to hunt a mouse, that's all. No need to worry, I'll find another."

Mosscloud looked faintly amused. "Alright. Try to catch as much as you can, remember? It's leaf-bare. We can't afford to lose any prey, none at all."

As though knowing about the extra heat now creeping through Foxnose, Mosscloud flashed him a faint smile before turning and flitting away through the forest, only to stop after moving a few tail-lengths away.

"Foxnose?"

He turned around, and Foxnose thought he caught a small flicker of anxiety in his voice.

"When you're done hunting, could I talk to you…about something?"

Heart skipping what felt like five beats, Foxnose nodded. Mosscloud smiled and turned again, vanishing into the trees.

"Well, gang," mewed Spiderfang, coming up from behind Foxnose, "let's get hunting."

* * *

><p>"You wanted to, er, talk?"<p>

Foxnose sat in a secluded corner of the forest, perched on a log. Mosscloud was on the log too, shuffling and never seeming to make eye contact with the ginger tom.

Foxnose, however, didn't mind. This situation was enough on its own without actually looking at Mosscloud, or Mosscloud looking at him.

"Oh, uh, yeah, I did, didn't I?" Mosscloud suddenly mewed, looking sheepish. "Er, Foxnose, the thing is…"

Foxnose thought he'd die from the sheer amount of beats his heart had skipped in a single day.

"Yeah?"

"I…" Mosscloud pawed at the log before raising his head and looking at the ginger tom. "I really like you, Foxnose. Really like, in that way."

Foxnose's eyes widened. Shocked into silence for a moment, he broke from the quiet when he saw Mosscloud beginning to look worried.

"Mosscloud, I do too. I really like you, in that way, and, I was so, I mean, you never really acted like it and I was afraid, you know, that you didn't like me back and I'd be stuck like this for the rest of my life, but…oh, Mosscloud…."

Reaching out his muzzle, Foxnose nuzzled Mosscloud, feeling as though a cloud had descended from the sky and lifted him up into the air, letting him fly freely through the world. He felt as though he could jump on that cloud and Mosscloud would too and they would fly away and live their lives adventuring together, two toms in love.

After a moment of silence, the two broke apart.

"Well…shall we get back to camp now?" Mosscloud meowed, looking straight at Foxnose for what felt like the first time in ages. His blue eyes, almost the same shade as a greenleaf sky, were bright with anticipation.

"Yeah." Standing and leaping off the log, Foxnose felt a smile play across his face. "Wanna race?"

Mosscloud's eyes narrowed. The ginger-and-white tom grinned. "You're on!"

"See you at camp, slow-kitty!"

Just as the two bolted into the forest, the snow began to fall.


End file.
